The impact of social networks on tourism

Social Networks are today part of our social lives and of our business lives as well. They influence every sector and can be source of competitive advantages, if well managed. In particular the present study wants to investigate how social networks have changed the tourist world. The objective is not only to photograph the actual scenario, but also to propose actions that can be effectively implemented in order to face this changing scenario. The main questions that this work tries to answer are: How did the tourist sector change after Web 2.0 arrival?,How is Italy trying to react to this phenomenon?,Are there any examples of success and failure in Italy?,What are the guidelines that can be followed by tourist players and How can concrete returns be measured? At the end readers will find a specific application to a real Italian case (Clubviaggi.it). This analysis should be especially useful to professionals in the marketing field and to all those people that want to understand and to investigate the huge potentials of social networks even in an apparently traditional world, such as the tourist one.